49 ESL Conversation Games & Activities - Jackie Bolen 2020

Toilet paper icebreaker
English conversation games and activities for all levels

Skills: Speaking/Listening

Time: 5-10 minutes

Level: Beginner to Advanced

Materials Required: Toilet paper

This is an icebreaker activity for the first day of class to help the students get to know each other in a fun way. Bring in a roll of toilet paper, and depending on the size of the class, tell the students that they can take a certain number of pieces (4-7 works well). Don't give them any other information.

It's also possible to play this game with a bag of wrapped candies (wrapped for sanitary reasons) and as the student completes each speaking task, they can eat the candy or put it into their bag to save for later. In fact, maybe all your classes would like this option better but it depends on your budget!

Once everyone has their papers, explain that they have to tell the class one thing about themselves for each square of paper they have. For each sentence, they "throw-away" one square until they're done. If you have an extremely large class, you can put the students in groups of 5-6 for this activity instead of playing all together as your would for a smaller class.

To make this into a conversation activity, allow one follow-up question from the group or class for each statement made. The person who asks the follow-up question gets to use up one of their squares too.

Teaching Tips:

Students are always curious about why they have a choice for how many squares they choose. Be mysterious and don't give away the secret until everyone has chosen. Mention that if someone has played this game before to keep the secret and not let their classmates know what's happening!

Procedure:

1. Divide the students into groups of 5-6 (larger classes), or play together for a smaller class.

2. Students choose the number of pieces of toilet paper that they want depending on your minimum and maximum criteria.

3. Tell the students that for each square they took, they must say one interesting thing about themselves.

4. The first student says one thing about themselves and discards that square into the pile in the middle (or eats the candy!). The other students could make a response of some sort such as “Me too,” or “Really?”, or “I can't believe it!”

5. An optional, but fun variation to turn this into a conversation activity is that the other students can have a chance to ask a follow-up question after each statement, but only one and the fastest person gets to do it. For each follow-up question, they can discard a square into the pile.